Quotes from Leigh Bardugo

I was one of those kids who looks really good on paper, I tested very well, I went to a fancy college, won some prizes. When I came out of school, I had many horrible jobs, but I didn't know what the path was to a creative life or the life of a writer.

I am keenly aware of how many people the Six of Crows stories' brought into the Grishaverse, and to me, the story of the Crows, of Kaz and his crew, provides a very different kind of story and point of view, than Shadow and Bone' and Alina's story.

If you have an idea, pursue it.

I think being a freelancer really taught me to hustle and gave me respect for anyone who puts it on the line every day for something creative.

It is a challenge to write in the real world once you've had the advantage of being able to create your own world.

And I desperately needed books that would take me out of my environment and show me a world where being smart and brave and prepared was more important than being cute or cheerful or knowing the right thing to say. And that's what science fiction and fantasy gave me.

Grief had its own life, took its own sustenance.

The characters in Six of Crows' aren't kings or queens; they don't have grand destinies. They're just six kids desperate enough to attempt the impossible.

And I'm a huge George R. R. Martin fan.

We aren't always comfortable witnessing real frailty or vulnerability in our heroines, but I like characters who struggle, and doubt, and who don't always do the wise thing.

Joe Trapanese did our score, and when he was first brought on to the project, he and I met up at a coffee shop. I remember just being like, 'I have many files for you.' So we sat there and just exchanged our favorite tracks like the nerds that we are. I subjected him to me singing a Ravkan folk song that is actually in Rule of Wolves.'

I'm pretty sure Magic Mike' is the best funded gender studies thesis ever so I'm going to have to see that.

My relationship with Twitter has evolved as my career has changed. The truth is unless you have a remarkably thick skin, as a creator, it's a very difficult place to be.

I had spared the stag's life. The power of that life belonged to me as surely as it belonged to the man who had taken it.

The one part of the Wonder Woman' story that never really did much for me was Steve Trevor.

At least when I was a kid and a reader, I loved the feeling of wondering whether or not something was real, being able to look up connections.

There is this really tight relationship between horror and shame. And shame is in all of my books as the biggest monster. And horror is all about creating a metaphor for something you can't face That connection is super powerful for me.

I think heroines would be pretty boring if they were perfect all the time.

Ravka has a very particular identity among the countries of the Grishaverse. It's surrounded by enemies. It has spent hundreds of years in near isolation because of the Shadow Fold. It is very much a garrison state so there's a tremendous desire to survive, but there's also a kind of soul-deep shrug that goes along with Ravkans knowing the odds.

'Shadow and Bone' was my first book, and I think I was unconsciously echoing a lot of the fantasy that I had grown up with, which sets a kind of default for straight white characters. And that's something I've tried to improve on as I write, to write more authentically and reflect the people around me in the world, around me more realistically.

When I created the Grisha, it was important that they be powerful but that they kind of represent the Jewish brain trust that developed before World War II and after World War II in the U.S.

Publishing and film are such different worlds for writers.

'Shadow and Bone' is a fantasy set in a country inspired by Tsarist Russia that has been literally torn apart by a swathe of nearly impenetrable darkness.

In our lives, we will all have a moment where we have to learn to hustle.